Once in a while I have time data where I would like to just visualize how often events are occurring. So I basically have a list of datetimes and I want to show a plot with
- x-axis is hour (0 - 24, hence 24 bins)
- y-axis is the number of events
So basically it is a histogram, grouped by hour.
I already have one solution, but how do I make sure that all 24 bins exist? (and it could look nicer, too)
Minimal Example
#!/usr/bin/env python
"""Create and visualize date with timestamps."""
# core modules
from datetime import datetime
import random
# 3rd party module
import numpy as np
import pandas as pd
from matplotlib import pyplot as plt
def create_data(num_samples, year, month_p=None, day_p=None):
"""
Create timestamp data.
Parameters
----------
num_samples : int
year: int
month_p : int, optional (default: None)
day_p : int, optional (default: None)
Returns
-------
data : Pandas.Dataframe object
"""
data = []
for _ in range(num_samples):
if month_p is None:
month = random.randint(1, 12)
else:
month = month_p
if day_p is None:
day = random.randint(1, 28)
else:
day = day_p
hour = int(np.random.normal(loc=7) * 3) % 24
minute = random.randint(0, 59)
data.append({'date': datetime(year, month, day, hour, minute)})
data = sorted(data, key=lambda n: n['date'])
return pd.DataFrame(data)
def visualize_data(df):
"""
Plot data binned by hour.
x-axis is the hour, y-axis is the number of datapoints.
Parameters
----------
df : Pandas.Dataframe object
"""
df.groupby(df["date"].dt.hour).count().plot(kind="bar")
plt.show()
df = create_data(2000, 2017)
visualize_data(df)
As you can see, the 7, 9 and 10 are missing.

